Up from the Ashes is the second Burn Halo album, but it essentially is the debut for the band that recorded it. The self-titled Burn Halo effort released in 2009 was more a James Hart solo album than anything else, the former Eighteen Visions frontman working songwriter/producer Zac Maloy and mostly session musicians. A real four-piece band backs Hart on Up from the Ashes, leading to a noticeably different sound.

The first album was full of party-rock anthems like “Dirty Little Girl” and “Our House.” While Hart’s vocals are instantly recognizable on Up from the Ashes, the music, via the driving rhythms and guitar leads, comes off as a hard rock version of Avenged Sevenfold. I don’t mean to say the band is an A7X clone; that’s simply to give you a starting point.

Burn Halo remains accessible and radio-friendly, but Up from the Ashes is fairly dynamic within those confines, offering songs of varying tempos and levels of heaviness. The standout—one of the best songs I’ve heard this year—is “Threw It All Away,” one of the mellower tracks, with an epic chorus and nice understated solo by lead guitarist Joey Roxx. At the other end of the spectrum, Hart dips back into his past for the pummeling, hardcore rhythm of “I Won’t Back Down” before it shifts into a hook-laden chorus—an impressive blend of styles.

Though it doesn’t reinvent any wheels, Up from the Ashes confirms Hart is here to stay as a voice in hard rock. Just as important, Burn Halo the band has become a force to be reckoned with.